A Walk around childhood woods.

When my brother and I were boys growing up in Woodhall Spa in Lincolnshire, playing down Kirkby Lane was always at the top of our agenda.  One of our favourite places was the 'old reservoir', now Kirkby Moor Nature Reserve managed by the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust.  Adjacent to this was Ostler's plantation run by the Forestry Commission and planted on the edge of the old RAF Woodhall WWII bomber base, a satellite of RAF Coningsby and at one time the base for the famous 617 'dam-busters' squadron commanded by Guy Gibson.  One of the biggest attractions of roaming in here was the old anti aircraft gun which we used to play on and act out the roles of heroes.  We also used to find discarded, but live, 303 ammunition which we used to put in our father's vice (unbeknownst to him!) pull out the bullet, empty out the cordite and then put back it together and polish it up.  How I have managed to reach the age of 70 I don't know.  As we entered our teens and took up distance running it was a favourite place to train for cross country; in fact the last time I was there was about 10 years ago when I ran in a Lincolnshire League cross country race.  The area is popular for walking, off road cycling and horse riding.  I had long been wanting to revisit this childhood playground and a visit to friends in Woodhall gave me the ideal opportunity.  Heather and I enjoyed a very pleasant walk through the woods enjoying the first signs of autumn.  It was also a splendid location for one of my favourite styles of photography: intimate landscape.  All too soon it was time to return home, but it will repay further exploration along with a visit to Kirkby Moor.  Unfortunately we were not able to locate the anti aircraft gun!